We introduce the class of piecewise convex transformations, and study their complexity. We apply the results to the complexity of polygonal billiards on surfaces of constant curvature.
We study polygonal billiards with one-sided vertical mirror scattered on a square billiard table. We associate trajectories of these kinds of billiards with double rotations and study orbit behavior and questions of complexity.
We prove that a polygonal billiard with one-sided mirrors has zero topological entropy. In certain cases we show sub exponential and for other polynomial estimates on the complexity.
It is well-known that billiards in polygons cannot be chaotic (hyperbolic). Particularly Kolmogorov-Sinai entropy of any polygonal billiard is zero. We consider physical polygonal billiards where a moving particle is a hard disc rather than a point (mathematical) particle and show that typical physical polygonal billiard is hyperbolic at least on a subset of positive measure and therefore has a positive Kolmogorov- Sinai entropy for any positive radius of the moving particle (provided that the particle is not so big that it cannot move within a polygon). This happens because a typical physical…
We prove that the natural invariant surface associated with the billiard game on an irrational polygonal table is homeomorphic to the Loch Ness monster, that is, the only orientable infinite genus topological real surface with exactly one end.
We show that in a typical polygon the billiard map as well as its associated subshift obtained by coding orbits by the sequence of sides they visit are topologically weakly mixing.
We introduce a new equivalence relation on the set of all polygonal billiards. We say that two billiards (or polygons) are order equivalent if each of the billiards has an orbit whose footpoints are dense in the boundary and the two sequences of footpoints of these orbits have the same combinatorial order. We study this equivalence relation with additional regularity conditions on the orbit.
We study polygonal billiards with reflection laws contracting the reflected angle towards the normal. It is shown that if a polygon does not have parallel sides facing each other, then the corresponding billiard map has finitely many ergodic SRB measures whose basins cover a set of full Lebesgue measure.
We prove that polygonal billiards with contracting reflection laws exhibit hyperbolic attractors with countably many ergodic SRB measures. These measures are robust under small perturbations of the reflection law, and the tables for which they exist form a generic set in the space of all polygons. Specific polygonal tables are studied in detail.
We establish a relationship between the word complexity and the number of generalized diagonals for a polygonal billiard. We conclude that in the rational case the complexity function has cubic upper and lower bounds. In the tiling case the complexity has cubic asymptotic growth.
We consider the set of polygons all of whose sides are vertical or horizontal with fixed combinatorics (for example all the figure "L"s). We show that there is a dense G $δ$ subset of such polygons such that for each polygon in this G $δ$ set the billiard flow is weakly-mixing in almost every direction.
Two polygons $P,Q$ are code equivalent if there are billiard orbits $u,v$ which hit the same sequence of sides and such that the projections of the orbits are dense in the boundaries $\partial P, \partial Q$. Our main results show when code equivalent polygons have the same angles, resp. are similar, resp. affinely similar.
A formal definition of a (mathematical) polygonal Andreev billiard and a construction of an equivalence relation that captures the dynamics described in physical toy model of Andreev reflection are given. The continuous flow and discrete flow on the respective phase spaces. It is then shown that the continuous flow preserves the absolute value of the volume element $dx\wedge dy\wedge dθ$ and the billiard (collision) map preserves the measure $\cos ϕdr dϕ$, respectively. One can then characterize the dynamics of a rational polygonal Andreev billiard table. Finally, a discussions of the effect o…
\textsc{J. Hadamard} studied the geometric properties of geodesic flows on surfaces of negative curvature, thus initiating "Symbolic Dynamics". In this article, we follow the same geometric approach to study the geodesic trajectories of billiards in "rational polygons" on the hyperbolic plane. We particularly show that the billiard dynamics resulting thus are just 'Subshifts of Finite Type' or their dense subsets. We further show that 'Subshifts of Finite Type' play a central role in subshift dynamics and while discussing the topological structure of the space of all subshifts, we demonstrate …
In this paper, we discuss rotation number on the invariant curve of a one parameter family of outer billiard tables. Given a convex polygon $η$, we can construct an outer billiard table $T$ by cutting out a fixed area from the interior of $η$. $T$ is piece-wise hyperbolic and the polygon $η$ is an invariant curve of $T$ under the billiard map $ϕ$. We will show that, if $β$ is a periodic point under the outer billiard map with rational rotation number $τ= p / q$, then the $n$th iteration of the billiard map is not the local identity at $β$. This proves that the rotation number $τ$ as a function…
The bounce spectrum of a polygonal billiard table is the collection of all bi-infinite sequences of edge labels corresponding to billiard trajectories on the table. We give methods for reconstructing from the bounce spectrum of a polygonal billiard table both the cyclic ordering of its edge labels and the sizes of its angles. We also show that it is impossible to reconstruct the exact shape of a polygonal billiard table from any finite collection of finite words from its bounce spectrum.
Consider two $k$-gons $P$ and $Q$. We say that the billiard flows in $P$ and $Q$ are homotopically equivalent if the set of conjugacy classes in the fundamental group of $P$ which contain a periodic billiard orbit agrees with the analogous set for $Q$. We study this equivalence relationship and compare it to the equivalence relations, order equivalence and code equivalence, introduced in \cite{BT1,BT2}. In particular we show if $P$ is a rational polygon, and $Q$ is homotopically equivalent to $P$, then $P$ and $Q$ are similar, or affinely similar if all sides of $P$ are vertical and horizontal…
We consider polygonal billiards with collisions contracting the reflection angle towards the normal to the boundary of the table. In previous work, we proved that such billiards has a finite number of ergodic SRB measures supported on hyperbolic generalized attractors. Here we study the relation of these measures with the ergodic absolutely continuous invariant probability measures (acips) of the slap map, the 1-dimensional map obtained from the billiard map when the angle of reflection is always equal to zero. Our main result states that for a generic polygon, if the reflection law has a Lips…
In this article, we study polygonal symplectic billiards. We provide new results, some of which are inspired by numerical investigations. In particular, we present several polygons for which all orbits are periodic. We demonstrate their properties and derive various conjectures using two numerical implementations.
We prove polynomial upper bounds for the deviation of ergodic averages for the straight line flow on every translation surface in almost every direction, in particular for those surfaces arising from rational polygonal billiards.
We introduce a new method for estimating the growth of various quantities arising in dynamical systems. We apply our method to polygonal billiards on surfaces of constant curvature. For instance, we obtain power bounds of degree two plus epsilon in length for the number of billiard orbits between almost all pairs of points in a planar polygon.
For a given rotation number we compute the Hausdorff dimension of the set of well approximable numbers. We use this result and an inhomogeneous version of Jarnik's theorem to show strong recurrence properties of the billiard flow in certain polygons
We introduce a new notion of stability for periodic orbits in polygonal billiards. We say that a periodic orbit of a polygonal billiard is $λ$-stable if there is a periodic orbit for the corresponding pinball billiard which converges to it as $λ$ $\rightarrow$ 1. This notion of stability is unrelated to the notion introduced by Galperin, Stepin and Vorobets. We give sufficient and necessary conditions for a periodic orbit to be $λ$-stable and prove that the set of d-gons having at most finite number of $λ$-stable periodic orbits is dense is the space of d-gons. Moreover, we also determine comp…
We study the notion of Fagnano orbits for dual polygonal billiards. We used them to characterize regular polygons and we study the iteration of the developing map.
We describe Veech groups of flat surfaces arising from irrational angled polygonal billiards or irreducible stable abelian differentials. For irrational polygonal billiards, we prove that these groups are non-discrete subgroups of SO(2,R) and we calculate their rank.
We consider polygonal billiards and we show the uniqueness of coding of non-periodic billiard trajectories in polygons whose holes have non-zero minimal diameters, generalising a theorem of Galperin, Krüger and Troubetzkoy.
We study the recurrence and ergodicity for the billiard on noncompact polygonal surfaces with a free, cocompact action of $\Z$ or $\Z^2$. In the $\Z$-periodic case, we establish criteria for recurrence. In the more difficult $\Z^2$-periodic case, we establish some general results. For a particular family of $\Z^2$-periodic polygonal surfaces, known in the physics literature as the wind-tree model, assuming certain restrictions of geometric nature, we obtain the ergodic decomposition of directional billiard dynamics for a dense, countable set of directions. This is a consequence of our results …
In the paper, we establish Squash Rigidity Theorem - the dynamical spectral rigidity for piecewise analytic Bunimovich squash-type stadia. We also establish Stadium Rigidity Theorem - the dynamical spectral rigidity for piecewise analytic Bunimovich stadia whose flat boundaries are a priori fixed. In addition, for smooth Bunimovich squash-type stadia we compute the Lyapunov exponents along the maximal period two orbit, as well as the value of the Peierls' Barrier function from the maximal marked length spectrum associated to the rotation number $\frac{2n}{4n+1}$.
Rigid bodies collision maps in dimension two, under a natural set of physical requirements, can be classified into two types: the standard specular reflection map and a second which we call, after Broomhead and Gutkin, no-slip. This leads to the study of no-slip billiards--planar billiard systems in which the moving particle is a disc (with rotationally symmetric mass distribution) whose translational and rotational velocities can both change at each collision with the boundary of the billiard domain. In this paper we greatly extend previous results on boundedness of orbits (Broomhead and Gutk…
We discuss the interplay between the piece-line regular and vertex-angle singular boundary effects, related to integrability and chaotic features in rational polygonal billiards. The approach to controversial issue of regular and irregular motion in polygons is taken within the alternative deterministic and stochastic frameworks. The analysis is developed in terms of the billiard-wall collision distribution and the particle survival probability, simulated in closed and weakly open polygons, respectively. In the multi-vertex polygons, the late-time wall-collision events result in the circular-l…
We describe the periodic orbits of the prefractal Koch snowflake billiard (the nth inner rational polygonal approximation of the Koch snowflake billiard). In the case of the finite (prefractal) billiard table, we focus on the direction given by an initial angle of pi/3, and define 1) a compatible sequence of piecewise Fagnano orbits, 2) an eventually constant compatible sequence of orbits and 3) a compatible sequence of generalized piecewise Fagnano orbits. In the case of the infinite (fractal) billiard table, we will describe what we call stabilizing periodic orbits of the Koch snowflake frac…
Polygonal slap maps are piecewise affine expanding maps of the interval obtained by projecting the sides of a polygon along their normals onto the perimeter of the polygon. These maps arise in the study of polygonal billiards with non-specular reflections laws. We study the absolutely continuous invariant probabilities of the slap maps for several polygons, including regular polygons and triangles. We also present a general method for constructing polygons with slap maps having more than one ergodic absolutely continuous invariant probability.
We consider the billiard in the exterior of a piecewise smooth body in two-dimensional Euclidean space and show that the maximum number of directions of invisibility in such billiard is at most finite.
Outer Billiards is a geometrically inspired dynamical system based on a convex shape in the plane. When the shape is a polygon, the system has a combinatorial flavor. In the polygonal case, there is a natural acceleration of the map, a first return map to a certain strip in the plane. The arithmetic graph is a geometric encoding of the symbolic dynamics of this first return map. In the case of the regular octagon, the case we study, the arithmetic graphs associated to periodic orbits are polygonal paths in R^8. We are interested in the asymptotic shapes of these polygonal paths, as the period …
We consider dispersing billiard tables whose boundary is piecewise smooth and the free flight function is unbounded. We also assume there are no cusps. Such billiard tables are called type D in the monograph of Chernov and Markarian. For a class of non-degenerate type D dispersing billiards, we prove exponential decay of correlation and several other statistical properties.
A planar polygonal billiard $¶$ is said to have the finite blocking property if for every pair $(O,A)$ of points in $¶$ there exists a finite number of ``blocking'' points $B_1, ..., B_n$ such that every billiard trajectory from $O$ to $A$ meets one of the $B_i$'s. As a counter-example to a theorem of Hiemer and Snurnikov, we construct a family of rational billiards that lack the finite blocking property.
The dynamics of a beam held on a horizontal frame by springs and bouncing off a step is described by a separable two degrees of freedom Hamiltonian system with impacts that respect, point wise, the separability symmetry. The energy in each degree of freedom is preserved, and the motion along each level set is conjugated, via action angle coordinates, to a geodesic flow on a flat two-dimensional surface in the four dimensional phase space. Yet, for a range of energies, these surfaces are not the simple Liouville-Arnold tori - these are tori of genus two, thus the motion on them is not conjugate…
It is shown that the set of 4-period orbits in outer billiard with piecewise smooth convex boundary has an empty interior, provided that no four corners of the boundary form a parallelogram.
We present a solution of the algebraic version of Birkhoff Conjecture on integrable billiards. Namely we show that every polynomially integrable real bounded convex planar billiard with smooth boundary is an ellipse. We extend this result to billiards with piecewise-smooth and not necessarily convex boundary on arbitrary two-dimensional surface of constant curvature: plane, sphere, Lobachevsky (hyperbolic) plane; each of them being modeled as a plane or a (pseudo-) sphere in $\mathbb R^3$ equipped with appropriate quadratic form. Namely, we show that a billiard is polynomially integrable, if a…
Here we are concerned with a special issue of billiard invisibility, where a bounded set with a piecewise smooth boundary in Euclidean space is identified with a body with mirror surface, and the billiard in the complement of the set is identified with the dynamics of light rays outside the body in the framework of geometric optics. We show that in this setting it is possible to construct a body invisible from two points.
We investigate the statistical properties of a piecewise smooth dynamical system by studying directly the action of the transfer operator on appropriate spaces of distributions. We accomplish such a program in the case of two-dimensional maps with uniformly bounded second derivative, but we are confident that the present approach can be successful in much greater generality (we hope including higher dimensional billiards). For the class of systems at hand, we obtain a complete description of the SRB measures, their statistical properties and their stability with respect to many types of pertur…
In a previous paper we defined a class of non-compact polygonal billiards, the infinite step billiards: to a given decreasing sequence of non-negative numbers $\{p_{n}$, there corresponds a table $\Bi := \bigcup_{n\in\N} [n,n+1] \times [0,p_{n}]$. In this article, first we generalize the main result of the previous paper to a wider class of examples. That is, a.s. there is a unique escape orbit which belongs to the alpha and omega-limit of every other trajectory. Then, following a recent work of Troubetzkoy, we prove that generically these systems are ergodic for almost all initial velocities,…
A body moves in a medium composed of noninteracting point particles; interaction of particles with the body is absolutely elastic. It is required to find the body's shape minimizing or maximizing resistance of the medium to its motion. This is the general setting of optimal resistance problem going back to Newton. Here, we restrict ourselves to the two-dimensional problems for rotating (generally non-convex) bodies. The main results of the paper are the following. First, to any compact connected set with piecewise smooth boundary $B \subset \mathbb{R}^2$ we assign a measure $ν_B$ on $\partial(…